In case anyone is wondering what’s going on with Scooter and Ferret updates in the new year, they haven’t fallen victim to the new baby – Scott’s just under a tight deadline for his freelance project. New strips will return next week. In the meantime, I would like to show off the new portfolio site I made for him, ScottBall.com. I was thrilled with the way this turned out, it’s a very smooth use of a WordPress theme and it’s magically easy to update. As you’ve probably noticed, we haven’t really converted this strip into a business yet, therefore Scott’s income comes entirely from illustration projects. A good illustrator needs a good website behind him to show him off.

After some very wild wild-goose-chases this month I put a deposit down on a condo rental last Friday. I’m going with the “location location location” philosophy by choosing an amenity-free, family-run little place that happens to be 12 minutes from where I work. And that’s if I take the main roads, I believe there may be a super-secret alternate route that’s almost direct. Some have advised me to buy again, but I can’t visualize buying again, especially without a deposit, or in Florida. Let’s all have some sanity this time. Anyway, buying has prevented me from trying out urban living, and I may have been missing out on something there. How convenient to have something, anything within walking distance. Even if it is a bowling alley.

I distinctly remember saying that if I wasn’t moving out of my house and into a smaller, temporary place, I wouldn’t mind having a Soda Stream. Yet in spite of my best efforts to discourage adding more items to the move, a genie granted my wish and a Soda Stream appeared under the tree this year. I immediately abandoned my misgivings and embraced my new appliance with reckless joy, leaving my nagging concerns for later… How hard was this going to be? What does homemade soda taste like? Are the supplies hard to get? Does this really save money? Tonight I had the house to myself, so I dug into the box and almost gave up right then when I saw how complicated it looked. Fortunately I didn’t allow myself to give in to intimidation and waded through the mult-language instruction booklet until I discovered that it was much easier than all of the parts made it appear. I placed the baby in her swing as it occurred to me that I might not want to have her strapped to my chest while I opened a canister of CO2, but as it turned out, getting the gas attached to the device was uneventful. The instructions said no more than 3 short pushes on the release lever were necessary, but nothing appeared to be happening in the water bottle, so I added a lot of extra taps. I was wrong about that too, the bottle once released had plenty of fizz. As for how it tastes, I should never have worried. The diet root beer is terrific. Now I have a supply of soda water always at hand for impromptu drinks from my amateur bar. Any more of this sophistication and I’m going to have to get a liquor license.